


Bye-Bye  Blackbird

by Synergic



Category: Sleep No More - Punchdrunk
Genre: M/M, spoilers for canon one-on-ones, unconventional feelings about taxidermy
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-25
Updated: 2020-12-25
Packaged: 2021-03-10 18:36:05
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,000
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28311726
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Synergic/pseuds/Synergic
Summary: Being a bartender exposes a person to  all sorts of drunken confessions and ugly truths, and that can broaden a man’s mind considerably.
Relationships: Speakeasy Bartender/Bargarran
Comments: 7
Kudos: 9
Collections: Yuletide 2020





	Bye-Bye  Blackbird

**Author's Note:**

  * For [codswallop](https://archiveofourown.org/users/codswallop/gifts).



“A present from The Lady.”

They don’t use names much. No point in it. If someone’s important then the whole town knows it, and if someone blends into the background-- well, maybe that’s where they’re supposed to be, playing the part of an unobtrusive, sympathetic ear, a hand on a bottle of something cheap and effective. 

Paisley’s not unique in that regard. He’s been a fixture in enough bars to know the rules and play with a grifter’s innate skill, all charm one moment, poker-faced the next. Whatever’s required to win.

Bargarran, meanwhile, is deep in the late stages of his own game. He has little enough time for anything else. 

But they’re both using the same deck of cards, as it were, which makes them allies in a way-- though _that’s_ an element of their relationship they haven’t found the time to discuss. Well. Bargarran doesn’t go in for words as a general rule. Not until he’s been pushed. Then, sometimes, he’ll come out with a truth so harsh it’s like he’s driving a pin through a specimen.

“It’s fresh.”

Ah, there’s a reaction; the bare hint of a glance that still manages to be a bit _too_ invested in the idea of a new body lying prone on the workbench, even if it is just a little blackbird. A pretty one though, if the delivery-boy does say so himself. Its neck must have been snapped very carefully indeed, given that the glossy feathers of its breast haven’t even been mussed. 

Most people dislike the idea of a man who gets _that_ kind of excited at the idea of taking a body apart with all the precision of a surgeon and none of the well-intentioned altruism. But to be fair, Bargarran’s second greatest joy seems to be petting and caressing the trophies he’s left with after the fact-- birds and beasts were never so cherished before. 

Besides, being a bartender exposes a person to all sorts of drunken confessions and ugly truths, and that can broaden a man’s mind considerably, not to mention damping down his morals and turning him into a misanthrope. That’s before you even stop to consider what kind of person that bartender might be if he were willing to throw away his whole life, past and present, for a phone call from a mysterious woman in a long red dress. To uproot himself and come to Paisley on the unsubstantiated promise that revenge will come, and blood will have blood someday. 

This bartender has done exactly that-- with nothing but the clothes on his back and a cardboard box of personal effects that had been tied with so much twine nothing but a sharp knife could get back into it. A box he’s never bothered to reopen, by the by. 

So they’re neither of them saints, and they both have their sins. At least with Bargarran you know what you’re getting right from the outset.

As to what goes on in the more private parts of his shop, where there’s a shower ready and waiting to wash down the blood from larger bodies . . . Well, they both have their back rooms, too. The one behind the bar has a list of names, and not all of them belong to people who are still counted among the living. 

No, he’s got no qualms about Bargarran, and no complaints when it comes to his enthusiasm either.

He puts a hand back over the blackbird and waits until he feels the heat of the taxidermist’s eyes on the drum of his skin instead. That’s when he knows that the man has moved on to making a tally of _his_ bones, the joints of fingers and knuckles.

“Who killed it?”

First round, but Bargarran’s letting his tells show tonight. His voice is a little too low and sandpaper harsh already.

“The Prince, I think. I found it in his office anyway. Hidden in a drawer like a dirty little secret.” He lets Bargarran think about that one for a long minute before he keeps going, slow as honey. “Of course, it could have been the secretary, but I hear no one’s seen her in a while.” That’s almost a question, and he lifts an eyebrow to show that it could be more of one. But Bargarran shakes his head, almost imperceptibly-- let it go --so he continues the process of winding the man up instead. 

“If it _was_ his Highness, I’m surprised our bird still has its guts. He likes to play with them. Thinks he can read his fate in blood and bones.“

“Fate.” There’s a chuckle in the other man’s voice now, but it’s almost too low to be classified as mirth. “No. He’s got it backwards. Fate is what happens when the knife comes down, not afterwards.”

He realizes then that he’ll be the first to fold tonight. It’s unexpected, but he’s watched enough card games from that omniscient space behind the bar to see the signs of it. (No one ever seems to realize how low that table really is, or how very high he’s perched.) And there are other signs: the sudden bloom of heat in his chest, the rush of blood almost audible in his eardrums.

Better to admit that he’s lost. He can even do it with a smirk and no particular regrets; a rare thing in this world.

“See . . . this is why I like you.”

A few words and a jackknife smile are really all it takes.

Bargarran’s hand lands heavy on his. It’s as cold as any of the man’s tools-- the scalpel, the file, hammer and pick, they both know them all by now, one way and another --but that won’t last for long. Bargarran might have come out of a different mold than most, but he’s still just a man. Somewhere down in the flat base of his palm, his pulse is on the rise. 

“The bird will keep,” he says, and pulls him in to keep him there.

**Author's Note:**

> Oh man I really hope you meant it when you said you would ship Speaks with anyone.


End file.
